Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a leuco dye appropriately employable for recording materials such as pressure-sensitive paper, heat-sensitive paper, etc., and more particularly to a novel leuco dye which is capable of developing into a colored dye having an absorption band in the near infrared region. The formed dye gives a color image which can be read out using an optical character reader (OCR). The present invention further relates a recording material containing the leuco dye.